Being a home-based entrepreneur has never been this enticing, thanks to the internet which has opened a lot of opportunities you never thought were possible before.
Back then, starting a business used to cost a lot, a stark contrast to how little one would need nowadays if they want to make money online. However, it’s not as simple as you think.
Firstly, always keep in mind that making money online is still work; there’s still a lot of work involved, and you need to do your homework to make it go your way. Do your research—what to do, who your market is, how much it will cost you, etc. Otherwise, the whole process could be overwhelming.
To get you started, you can try out a few proven income sources.
Three tried-and-tested ways to make money online
1. Sell Products
A sure way to make money from home is selling products through affiliate marketing or giving feedback on products that you’ve tested and used so readers and followers of your social media accounts could try them out, too. Should the reader end up buying the product, you will get a commission.
The good thing here is that you don’t have to worry about having your product to sell. Just be truthful with your reviews of the products you are trying out and traffic to your site or accounts will follow. You should also have an idea of the profile of your followers, so you will know which products are useful to them. Your reputation is on the line here so make sure to either be honest with what you post or don’t try out products that are of no help to your readers.
The downside to this is that there is no assurance that the number of people reading your blog will purchase the product. How much you will earn from these—from a few hundreds to thousands of dollars—will depend on the affiliate. In one year that I did affiliate marketing, I earned $36,649, less than half of the $83,065 I’ve made from five blogs and freelancing.
If you want to give this a try, check out CJ Affiliates on how to get you started. You may also do a generic search for products and companies with an affiliate program. Once you’re in, you will receive a link that you can include your posts to promote the product.
Keys to Making Money with Affiliates
Be discerning with the products you are trying to sell. You will need to try out a lot to smooth out your income, but make sure not to push for everything that comes your way.
Be creative with your reviews. Use visuals that will show that you have used the product. Let photos and videos show the changes (hopefully positive) that you noticed after using the product.
Avoid graphic banners; your readers will ignore them. Go straight to the point: write a review, convince your readers to buy, and include a link that will lead them to site where they can buy the product.
2. Try self-publishing
Take your writing career a notch higher by trying self-publishing. This income source is easily my favorite. It’s a passive income source that allows you to earn big as long as you’re diligent enough to be able to create a new product every three months.
I have been doing this the last couple of years, and this is how I did so far—10 books published and $21,803 in earnings, or about $1,800 a month. Now imagine how much you can make if you can regularly come up with new material.
Now you ask: what am I going to write? That’s the advantage of being a blogger. Since you’re already creating content around a particular theme, build up on that so you will be able to create enough material to produce an entire series of books to sell online.
Keys to Self-publishing Within Three Months
Brainstorm your book idea—what do you want the readers to know and what is the transformation they can expect after reading your book.
Research on other books that has a similar theme to yours and go over the reviews. That should give you an idea of what to include in your book.
Start outlining the chapters based on existing materials.
Over the next few weeks, start writing or polishing the existing material. Post every chapter you finish to your blog so you can keep track of when you should finish your book. Once completed, put all chapters together and add extra content for readers who will buy your book.
Go back to each book-related blog post and update it with a call to action and a link to your Amazon book page. Doing these ensures traffic to your blog, which will now become a marketing channel for your book.
Advertise. Yes, at some point, you need to spend on advertising. That’s just how it is. I spend about $20 on Amazon advertising each month.
3. Do videos, make money
Advertising and affiliate partnerships make good money, self-publishing is even better, but making online courses is the best. As they say, the real money is in creating and selling your products.
While you benefit from Amazon’s monthly views by self-publishing, the thing is the $3 you make for every copy sold is a far cry from the $300 you could make by selling video courses.
Video courses may take longer to develop and may not sell as many as books, but you only need a few sales to make thousands a month.
Creating great courses isn’t as difficult as it seems. Don’t be intimidated by the technicalities that go with operating the camera to make a video. The most challenging part here is converting your book material into a video course that is both entertaining and instructional.
Key Tips for Making Money with Video Courses
Courses don’t necessarily have to be lengthy. Try to be concise and engaging without compromising content and creativity. Include talking head videos, slideshow presentations, or even animations. Share personal experiences if you have to.
Invest in equipment. Get a quality webcam or DSLR camera and a digital microphone.
In producing the video, keep this in mind—what is the change you want to create? People don’t buy information; they buy the transformation.
These three aren’t the only sources for online income, but these have been proven to bring in money. They are passive income sources so you have to make sure you regularly come up with a new product.
Have you tried any of these? How was your experience?
Share them, together with essential tips, in the comment box below and help budding online entrepreneurs reading this.
